Gustav Mahler

A bouncy marimba ring tone on an iPhone erupted during the final soft, almost unbearably poignant minutes of Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 9 at a recent New York Philharmonic concert in Lincoln Center.

Music director Alan Gilbert finally reached his tipping point. He stopped the orchestra and turned to face a seemingly oblivious patron. The man, speaking anonymously to The New York Times as "Patron X," later said he had put his newly acquired iPhone on silent but had no idea an alarm had been set on it.

When the offending device finally stopped, the conductor tried again to bring Mahler's wrenching 80-minute...

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It was the cellphone heard 'round the world.
A bouncy marimba ring tone on an iPhone erupted during the final soft, almost unbearably poignant minutes of Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 9 at a recent New York Philharmonic concert in Lincoln Center.
Music...